Dark Secrets Box Set

by Angela M Hudson

  “Stop being so sexy, and I’ll stop tickling.”

  “No!” I took a breath and squealed again, jerking like an eel out of water. “Stop it, or I’ll wet myself.”

  “No, you won’t—liar.” He laughed, but stopped anyway, pinning my hands to the bed beside my face, his breath heavy through smiling lips.

  I looked up into those knowing eyes. “You don’t play fair. You’re stronger than me.”

  “Ha!” he scoffed. “And how is it that you are playing fair—lying on the bed, looking at me like that, then asking me to do less than honorable things to you?”

  “I didn’t ask you to do those things, David.” I smiled, pushing up on one elbow as he backed slightly away. “I only thought of them.”

  “Precisely. And right now, your thoughts are as clear as day, Miss Ara-Rose, and I fear I am not strong enough to endure them.”

  With a wry smile, I flipped him onto his back. He crashed down with a jolt, and I landed on top of him, my hair in his face, legs on either side of his hips. “Clearly, David, since you resist my charms every time, you are stronger than me.”

  He shook his head, sweeping my hair back over my arm and out of his face. “I’m not, my love.”

  “Then, let’s—”

  “Not tonight.”

  “Er!” I groaned. “See, you are stronger than me, and faster and so damn sexy you make it hard to breathe.”

  “All the better to subdue you with, my prey.”

  “Ha-ha. Funny.” Not. But I felt like his prey, being left without a choice and all.

  He smiled. “And you’d make a lovely meal.”

  I slapped his hand away from my throat. “Don’t even think about it. I’ve spent all day making that damn turkey. Vampire or not, you’re eating it!”

  “I plan to eat the turkey—just not the one in the oven.”

  A small smile moved my lip. “Are saying I’m a ridiculous-looking bird?”

  “No, merely ridiculous.”

  “Wow. Merry Christmas to you, too.”

  “You know I’m kidding.” He wrapped my hips firmly and shifted me up an inch so my leg-join no longer dug into his zipper. “That wasn’t my zipper,” he said.

  My mouth fell open. “So how come you can read my mind so easily today?”

  He smiled, his sharp fangs showing. “When you get hot like this”—he nodded at my unusual position—“I can read them like they’re written in bold print.”

  “Really.” I leaned down, brushing my lips past his before whispering in his ear. “How do you know I’m all hot?”

  “Because”—he smiled playfully—“I can smell it.”

  “Smell it?” I sat back a little.

  “Yes, and it’s very hard for me to refuse you when you get hot like this.” He shifted his hips under me again, moving me so I sat a little further down—right on top of his… zipper. “I can taste your warmth when I breathe you in.”

  “Is that… a good thing?”

  He laughed. “Not really. Not when I’m trying not to do naughty things to you. But I like it.” His shoulders lifted with his breath. “You smell good, and it tastes good.”

  “How can you taste it?”

  “It’s like—” David rolled me onto my back and laid his body alongside mine, his head propped up by his hand. “It’s like walking past a vase of frangipanis and tasting that sweet layer of perfume on your tongue. Don’t you ever get that?”

  “Actually, I do, now you mention it. Kind of like the rain, too—how it has a sugary taste when you breathe it in.”

  “Yes, exactly.”

  “So, what do I taste like then?” I said with a suggestive grin.

  “Creamy vanilla.” David slid his finger down my black satin dress and slowly back up again, revealing my thighs inch by inch as he went. “See, you’re getting hotter—the taste is getting sweeter.”

  My chest sunk like the air was helium, everything in my room fading to white fog around me as he slid his finger under the rim of my cotton underwear, cooling my skin where he’d never touched before.

  Oh, my God! I wrung my fingers into my hair, parting my legs at the knees, knowing too well he was wearing the smuggest grin right now. Do it, please, you’re driving me crazy, just do it.

  “Do what, Ara?” he spoke in a low, hypnotic voice.

  “Touch me.” I closed my eyes tighter, my toes curling, sending the tightness up my legs to the fine hairs of previously forbidden territory. He drew a slow, curved line around the inside of my thigh and moved toward the warmth beneath my undies again.

  “Ara?” He leaned close, his breath entering my ear.

  “Mm?” I squeaked.

  “They’re here.” His finger came away and he pulled my dress down as he stood up.

  “Argh!” I exhaled, digging my palms into my eye sockets. “You’ve got to be kidding me!”

  “Come on.” I saw his hand in my periphery.

  “No. I need a moment. Please?”

  “Okay, but don’t be too long. Your dad will think I did something nasty to you.” David sauntered away, laughing to himself.

  I’m going to kill you. I’m officially going to kill you!

  I composed myself quickly and, still shaking, stumbled out to greet my family.

  “Ara?” Dad stopped mid-pass as he handed David his coat. “Everything okay?”

  “Sure, Dad. It’s great. Merry Christmas.” I smiled and kissed his cheek.

  * * *

  Dinner was perfect. The first and last Christmas with all the people I love, in my new house. And after I said goodbye to Sam, Dad, and Vicki, I sat by the piano waiting for David to come out of the shower—probably a cold one.

  “That’s my favorite Christmas song.” Mike rested his elbows on the piano top.

  “Silent night?” I said. He nodded. “I didn’t know that.”

  “I’m a man of mystery,” he said playfully.

  I sighed. “You wanna play a duet?”

  “Maybe if you ask me with even a tiny hint of enthusiasm.” He sat beside me. “What’s up, baby? You were really distant at dinner tonight. Turkey was good, but you—”

  “I know.” I sighed. “I’m okay, really.”

  Mike took over the right hand of the song, while I played the left. “I know you, Ara. You can’t lie to me—something’s up. What is it?”

  My hands fell into my lap, a lovely ringing C chord stopping dead and taking the warmth of the song with it. “I’m going to miss them, Mike. Mom and Dad. I hadn’t realized that until I saw them tonight.”

  He reached for my wrist, absently toying with the pink-and-white pearl bracelet he and Emily gave me for Christmas. “Are you scared that the vampires might catch you?”

  I nodded, lifting one shoulder.

  “Ara, baby.” He cupped my wrist, shaking his head. “I’ll protect you, you know—for the rest of forever. I’ll never let them hurt you. I promise.”

  “You know what’s funny?” I said, letting my head fall against his shoulder. “I actually believe you. And for what it’s worth, that does make me feel a little better.”

  “Happy to help.” Mike squeezed my shoulders.

  Another pair of cool arms came up from behind to hug us both. “I want to hear a happy song,” Emily trilled. “Can you teach me to play something Christmassy?”

  “Sure.” I shuffled over, and Mike moved off the stool, landing on the couch. “Okay, place your pinkie on the C, your middle finger on the E, and your thumb on the G.”

  Emily sat still though, with her hands in her lap, eyes on the keys.

  “Em, what is it?”

  “She’s listening,” Mike noted, sitting forward as if to catch her.

  “To what?”

  “David,” he stated.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I can hear him.” She shook off her trance then and smiled at me, her eyes dark and round.

  “Hear him?” I wanted to jump up and stomp my feet. “Hear his thoughts?”


  “Kind of,” she said, sinking one shoulder.

  Oh, hell-to-the-no! This was Caps-lock, exclamation-level unfair. “I—H… how?”

  “It’s not like I can hear his actual thoughts, but sometimes I can, like, feel them.”

  “What the hell? Emily, what do you mean?”

  “It’s—” She looked to Mike for help. “It’s like I can tell what he’s thinking from what he’s feeling.”

  My mouth hung open, dry. I snapped it shut. “Well, what… what’s he feeling now?”

  Emily looked at Mike again, her lips pressed thin. “Let’s just play a song.”

  “No. Em, please?” I grabbed her arm. “What’s wrong with him?”

  “Nothing.” She shrugged, then smiled to herself. “He’s just—suffering.”

  “What?” I jumped up. “Where is he?”

  “Not like that, Ara. He’s okay. He’s just feeling—” She laughed then and looked away.

  “What?”

  “Never mind. Just leave him be.” She grabbed my hand as I edged away. “Just leave him alone—trust me.”

  Mike stood up and walked toward my room.

  “Well, how come he can go?”

  “’Cause he’s a guy. It’s a guy thing.”

  A guy thing? “Is this about sex?”

  “Sex?” Emily gaped. “No. Nothing to do with it, why?”

  “Then why is he suffering?”

  “Ara, just shut up and teach me a song.” She rolled her eyes, placing her fingers on the keys. “He’s fine. I promise.”

  * * *

  Candles flickered on the boughs of our Christmas tree, dancing like fireflies in the reflection of the bay window as I sat overlooking the blackness, my eyes focusing every now and then on my face in the window or the frosted glass chess board on the table in front of me. But a silhouette stole my gaze upward, a pair of intense green eyes appearing a moment later. I smiled at my vampire, moving my foot off the opposite chair so he could sit down.

  “I have something for you,” he said.

  “But you already gave me my Christmas present.” I clutched the silver locket—the one I opened early this morning, when David woke me from a restful dream and placed a small green box with a red bow in my hands. The locket was back where it belonged now, safely against my chest.

  David subdued a mischievous grin. “It’s something else—something that’s been missing from your life for too long.” He extracted a hand from his pocket, and something clinked on the glass board in front of me. “It’s time this found its way home again.”

  There, among the white and black pieces to a game of strategy, sat the knight—the black knight that was lost from my chess set before the box had been opened.

  “You? This was from you?” I picked up the small wooden piece.

  “It was a message.” David’s eyes focused on my fingers as I twirled the knight around.

  “A message?”

  “The uh…” He cleared his throat, shifting awkwardly in his seat. “The missing knight.”

  “Missing knight?” I thought about that for a second, trying not to laugh as I pieced it together. “This was a message that you were missing?”

  He nodded.

  “But it’s wrong, David. That’s not what’s been missing.” I put the knight down. “You’re not a piece in a game; you’re my soul mate. My everything. Not some cheaply carved wooden representation.”

  “It was a metaphor.”

  “It was poor one. Especially since, if you were a chess piece, you wouldn’t be the black knight.”

  “Then which piece am I?”

  “Maybe you’re not a piece at all?”

  “If you had to choose?” He grinned, eyes glistening in the candlelight.

  I shook my head, looking at the board. “The king,” I said, and picked it up.

  “Why the white king?” He took it from my hand and studied it. “I’m a vampire—a killer. I’m pure evil, Ara.”

  “You have a good heart, David—full of integrity. And it’s moral strength that makes a king a good one or a bad one, not the deaths that occur at his hands.”

  “So, now I’m moral, am I?” he asked in a light tone, resting the king back on the board.

  “You always were. You just didn’t know it.”

  “Hm,” he mused, “you don’t know me very well, then.”

  “I know you better than you might think.”

  “To make that statement shows how little you know.” He stood half way, crouching as he dragged the chair closer. “I like that you think kindly of me, though. It makes me feel like less of a monster.”

  “Do you really believe that you’re a monster?”

  “There’s no belief or opinion. I am what I am.” He took my hand across the table. “I never wanted you to learn of the things I’ve done, Ara, but when we go to Paris you will hear things, and I—”

  “David.” I sat on the edge of my chair, tilting my neck up a little to lift his gaze with my own. “I don’t care what you’ve done. Really. You could’ve been a lawyer in the past and I wouldn’t hold it against you.” I chuckled once.

  David didn’t though. He only scratched his head, narrowing one eye.

  “What?” I tipped back. “Was my joke that bad?”

  “Ara, I am a lawyer.”

  I burst out laughing, my hands barely catching the gust of air. “I forgot about that.”

  “How did you know?”

  “Eric told me.”

  David’s smile twitched under his tight lips as I rolled back in my chair, clutching my stomach.

  “So you love me still?” he asked.

  As my cackling settled to breathy hiccups, I shook my head. “I love you to pieces, David, even if you’re a blood-hungry lawyer.”

  “Good.” He grabbed my hand and squeezed it tight, as if he owned it. I liked that. “Because you will hear things you won’t like. So just remember that, okay? Just remember that you love me—no matter what.”

  “Okay.” I nodded, the hilarity settling. “No matter what. And you love me no matter what, right?”

  “Always,” he said with surety.

  “What if I changed a child?”

  David released my hand, eyes darkening. “What do you know about that?”

  “Only that it’s against the law.” I shrugged. His reaction said, do not elaborate or Eric may lose a limb.

  “How do you know about that?”

  “You should know. Didn’t you read everything in my mind that happened while you were away?”

  “Eric told you?”

  “Yes. Didn’t you see the conversation?”

  “No.”

  Thank God. Eric was safe for another day.

  He slumped back in his chair, his face awash with thought. “I wish I’d paid closer attention now.”

  “Oh, well,” I said casually. “Eric just told me that there were vampires who were children.”

  “And that’s all he told you?”

  I nodded. It wasn’t convincing, but I think even David wanted to avoid the truth—avoid telling me about Pepper having turned a young boy.

  “Ara?” He inclined toward me, closing his hands together as a grave seriousness overshadowed his kind eyes. “Never, ever change a child. I don’t care what your reasons are—don’t ever do it. Do you understand?”

  “Okay.” I nodded. “You know I wouldn’t do that though, right?”

  “I hope not. There is nothing that haunts me more than the memory of those children.” He stared blankly. “I would give any part of myself to find them a path to freedom.”

  “You care?”

  He looked at me. “Always.”

  “Can they be freed?”

  “It’s an eternal argument, Ara. Some say there are ways to teach them civility, others disagree. But I’m an advocate for their well-being. I fund research and fight”—he cleared his throat, that last word softening as he realized—“Fought for their rights using my position on the Council.”
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br />   “So do you think they’ll ever find a way to let them live out of the dungeons?”

  When David looked at me with that calculating gaze, I knew I’d said too much. “Yes. And any being who would think to keep that from them is not worthy of life.”

  “Well, what about the vampires who changed them, what happened to them?”

  David shot up out of his chair and took a few deep breaths, his fists clenched tightly at his sides. “For your own sake, Ara, don’t ever ask me that question again.”

  “Why?”

  He opened his mouth to speak, but just balled his fists tighter and walked away instead, stiff from the neck down.

  Whoa, overreaction of the century. Maybe he was right to be worried if I’d still love him after learning all his secrets.

  The bedroom door slammed behind David and guilt kicked in like a piece of bread stuck down my throat. I shouldn’t have probed him like that. Eric warned me it was a sensitive issue. But I just wanted him to tell me about Pepper himself—about how he sentenced her after she changed that boy. I wanted to ask him if he did that because of his love for the law, his detest for the fate of the Immortal Damned, or a newfound hatred for her after he discovered her betrayal. But the bigger part inside me wondered what he’d do if I broke the law. Would I suffer Pepper’s fate—being sentenced at his hand?

  What scared me the most was that, for all I knew about David, I couldn’t honestly answer that question. I was suddenly really looking forward to this Paris trip. Hopefully, it would give me a unique opportunity to find out once and for all who this David Knight really was.

  If he wouldn’t tell me, his past would.

  * * *

  The fleeting winter sunshine went on holiday, which was perfect because I wanted nothing of the blue skies. Darkness and solitude were on the menu, and I found them under my blanket, my body cradled by the indent of my mattress.

  “What’s wrong, Ara?” David stood in the doorway.

  I hugged my knees to my chest, pinning the hot water bottle closer to my tummy.